Varsity crews from the Bromfield Acton-Boxborough rowing team competed at the Head of the Fish Regatta, logging multiple top-10 times at the Saratoga Springs, New York, contest on Oct. 29 and 30. Nearly 1,700 crews from 134 teams and clubs raced a 3.2-kilometer course on Fish Creek. BA-B’s girls and boys first varsity 4s and Eliza Straayer in the single all finished in fifth place in their events against top-ranked teams not only in the region but in the country, said Holly Hatton, the team’s rowing program director. “There’s a lot of potential here for next spring,” she said.
In any Saratoga story, the weather is a main character. This time, fog delayed the start of racing for two hours on both Saturday and Sunday mornings. The rowers reported to the course only to see their boats rimed with ice. But each day the sun burned through. By the time the girls singles lined up to race, Hatton said, “The water was a mill pond. We couldn’t have had more perfect conditions.”
Sometimes it’s hard to refocus after the Head of the Charles, said Hatton, who is also the girls varsity head coach. But the athletes were raring to go. Rachel Walker was supposed to “hot-seat” from the quad into the second varsity 4. That’s when a rower finishes a race and then quickly jumps into another boat to compete again immediately. With the condensed schedule due to the fog delay, there just wasn’t enough time. Coxswain Adhiti Venkatesh took one for the team and hopped into the rower’s seat in Walker’s place, and Amita Khurana coxed, Hatton said.
The boys had a mixed agenda in Saratoga, said Gary Piantedosi, their head varsity coach. “Some guys want to try small-boat racing; some want to race with friends. At the core, we still want to test ourselves against the best crews.” Competition is always stiff for the first-place fish-head plaques that regatta host Saratoga Rowing Association makes with real taxidermied fish heads; crews from across the northeastern United States and Canada come to play. While no fish heads boarded the bus back to Massachusetts, Piantedosi said, “Our first varsity 4 captured some lightning in a bottle” with their fifth-place finish, and the first varsity 8 “followed up a strong Head of the Charles race with an eighth-place finish here.”
Rounding out the team’s top-10 finishes were the girls second and third varsity 4s in sixth and 10th place, and the girls second varsity 8 in ninth.
In keeping with BA-B tradition, some crews chose to dress in costume for a Halloween treat; the girls first varsity quad competed in full Spider-Man suits.
The novice and middle school squads stayed local, competing on the Merrimack River in Lowell at the Massachusetts Public Schools Rowing Association’s Fall Championship Regatta on Sunday, Oct. 30. BA-B eighth-grade girls and boys quads were the only ones bold enough to enter their events. The girls novice doubles won gold and bronze medals, and their first novice 8 took silver. The boys first novice 4 won gold in the 4.5-kilometer contest. “The Mass Publics is a smaller field of teams, but it’s very competitive,” said Christopher Whitbeck, head grade 8 and novice boys coach. “Everyone needs to be rowing their best. Our teams trained hard all season and it showed this weekend. We’re very proud of all of our squads. They are the future of BA-B, and that future is looking strong.”
The Battle of Saratoga may have been the turning point in the American Revolution, but this weekend’s regattas were more like Yorktown, bringing the team’s competitions to a conclusion. “No one wants the season to end,” Piantedosi said. Racing returns in the spring.
Varsity boys
- U17 1x: Shankara Rao, 29th place, 16 minutes, 08.87 seconds; Wyatt Neville, 33rd, 16:44.33 time
- U19 1x: Charles Maxwell, 16th, 14:14.91; Leo Sullivan, 34th, 15:14.64
- U17 2x: Wyatt Neville and Ulad Danilovich, 21st, 13:56.81
- 1V2x: William Pharo and Milo Whitbeck, 20th, 13:59.83
- 1V4: Derek Uhrich, Atticus Keep, Matthew Chytil, Charles Maxwell, and coxswain Lucas Villaseñor, 5th, 11:36.10
- 2V4+: Maxwell Hurlbut-Lesk, Sam Goldgar, Jorgen Johannesen, Aidan Lemke, and coxswain Ben Bluth, 12th, 13:12.27
- 3V4+: Jeffery Chang, Alexander Horton, Gavin Datta, Trevor Magnus, and coxswain Wyatt Neville, 20th, 14:00.60
- 1V8+: Aidan Nolte, Leo Sullivan, Derek Uhrich, Adam Castriotta, Matthew Chytil, Atticus Keep, Charles Maxwell, William Pharo, and coxswain Lucas Villaseñor, 8th, 10:57.49
- 2V8+: Noah Stein, William Thomas, Milo Whitbeck, Abraham Rahman, Ulad Danilovich, Shankara Rao, Jorgen Johannesen, Aidan Lemke, and coxswain Ben Bluth, 15th, 12:29.04
- 3V8+: Kyle Sharma, Noah Friedman, Charlie Leuci, Alexander Horton, Jeffery Chang, Myles McCormick, Gavin Datta, Trevor Magnus, and coxswain Nathan Kushner, 17th, 13:17.93
Varsity girls
- U17 1x: Beatrice Maxwell, 35th,15:46.09; Emma Gregg, 41st, 15:55.27 time
- U19 1x: Eliza Straayer, 5th, 14:30.48; Rachel Walker, 29th, 16:23.94 time
- U17 2x: Beatrice Maxwell and Emma Gregg, 30th, 15:59.54 time
- 1V4x: Rachel Walker, Sophia Atwell, Nosara Maxwell, Zoe Gendreau-Distler, 13th, 13:27.08
- 1V4+: Eliza Straayer, Beatrice Maxwell, Emma Gregg, Mia Hartley, and coxswain Evelyn Huang, 5th, 13:05.04
- 2V4+: Nina Manglani, Sophia Philipp, Emma Lawson, Elizabeth Feirouz, and coxswain Hannah Tandang, 6th, 14:09.88; Alexis Nichols, Yolander Yang, Nooriya Taherbhoy, Adhiti Venkatesh, and coxswain Amita Khurana, 10th, 15:59.44
- 1V8+: Rachel Walker, Sophia Atwell, Nosara Maxwell, Zoe Gendreau-Distler, Mia Hartley, Emma Gregg, Beatrice Maxwell, Eliza Straayer, and coxswain Amita Khurana, 13th, 12:42.61
- 2V8+: Nooryia Taherbhoy, Alexis Nichols, Yolander Yang, Evelyn Huang, Elizabeth Feirouz, Emma Lawson, Sophia Philipp, Nina Manglani, and coxswain Hannah Tandang, 9th, 13:07.53
Jill Maxwell is a BA-B parent.
